


freckles and constellations

by water_poet



Category: Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angry Kissing, Angry Sex, Canon Compliant, Chance Meetings, Enemies to Lovers, Healing, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Reunions, Reunited and It Feels So Good, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, i sure think so, is it love?, right up there with good omens, this book is so much gayer than it has any right to be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 14:44:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19297867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/water_poet/pseuds/water_poet
Summary: "I hate you" he hisses into the crook of Ralph's neck. He says it like he means it.He doesn't."I know" Ralph breathes. He doesn't mean it either





	freckles and constellations

**Author's Note:**

> Future fic where our fav bois wind up at the same university after six years apart and fall in love all over again.

They meet again half a decade later as summer is ending and the trees in the university courtyard are flushing shades of red and orange under a slate-grey sky.  
  
He sees him across the cobblestones, alone, his hair the same color as the falling leaves and a tired scowl etched across his face.  
  
Their eyes meet as he approaches and Jack pretends not to know him.  
  
"Fancy seeing you here, Merridew"  
  
Jack's lip curls like there's a sour taste in his mouth.  
  
"What are you doing here?" he growls.   
  
Ralph wants to smile because Jack's acting like a disgruntled cat and he can almost picture his fiery hair standing on end in annoyance.  
  
"I go to school here, Jack. Am I incorrect in assuming you do as well?" he asks. He knows his voice is coy and it's rubbing Jack's fur the wrong way but part of him is a little bit in love with the way Jack's eyes are flashing like lightning over the sea.  
  
"Not anymore" Jack replies, hand tightening around his satchel strap until his freckles stand out like stars against milky white knuckles. "I think I'll transfer to China. Or Brazil. Anywhere but here"  
  
Ralph can't imagine Jack anywhere but here and now, his hair a little too short and his clothes a little too big, so he smiles with dry lips and sticks out his hand as they stand facing each other in the grey cobblestone courtyard on the grey September morning that marked the beginning of the end of the world.  
  
"I'm glad to see you, Jack" Ralph says.  
  
He means it, and honesty suits him just as well as it always has, even now as the wind blows his golden hair and his red tie and the school chatters around him as Jack is reminded of so many things he'd fought to forget.  
  
Jack's stomach knots and he glares and shoves past him, flaming hair quickly fading into the crowd and leaving Ralph alone in the grey and red with something like affection in his smile.  


* * *

  
They meet again, of course.

Jack doesn't transfer across the ocean, but he does deliberately sit as far from Ralph in the lecture hall as he can, but even so he glances back again and again as the professor drones and somehow Ralph always meets his eye.  
  
He packs up his books as quickly as he dares, but Fate is not about to let him escape her ploy so easily so he hears Ralph's voice beside him even as he tries desperately to do the buckle on his satchel.  
  
"Fascinating lecture, wouldn't you say?"   
  
"Dreadfully so" Jack mumbles, the bite he had intended to add dissolving like sugar on his tongue as he looks up and sees Ralph's grey eyes like the beach on a cloudy day.  
  
"You need the notes?" he offers idly, as if there's anything so friendly about their relationship.  
  
"No" Jack replies shortly.  
  
For a moment Ralph looks pitying, but he says nothing and leaves, brushing Jack's shoulder in a farewell gesture as he does so. It stings like acid when he's gone.  
  
Jack shoulders his bag, waiting several minutes before exiting the classroom and marching down the hall.   
  
Ralph makes him sick. His legs shake and his palms sweat and his whole stomach is filled with a hollow fluttering.   
  
He hates it, of course, but what frightens him is he likes it, too. He likes the way his head gets light and his chest gets heavy around Ralph, like he's floating in the sea, golden and pale and sickeningly gentle.  
  
He wishes Ralph would hate him back.  


* * *

  
His family moved from Brighton to London shortly after the island because their son couldn't so much as look out the window at the sea before feeling sick.   
  
In the heat of the city, Jack forgot.  
  
It was slow going, but soon the cars rushing by was not the wind in the trees and the screeching of tired was not the squealing of a pig and the shouting in the street a few blocks down was not his own mind trying to tear itself apart.  
  
His therapist said exercise would help.  
  
So that's what he did.  
  
He ran, he swam, he joined the wrestling team and won two championships.   
  
When he was out of breath, he was too tired to remember the past, so he wasted hours around the track until his chest tasted like pennies and he could barely think.   
  
It's the start of autumn and he knew Ralph would be there, because Ralph was always there. This is his punishment, his Purgatory for all his crimes.  
  
He runs and he sets a personal record and he can feel Ralph's eyes on him like the devil on his back.   
  
Ralph plays football.  
  
"You looked good out there" he says cheerfully, tossing the football from one hand to the other. "We should train together sometime"  
  
Jack mutters something noncommittal, rummaging in his bag for nothing in particular as he tries to avoid staring at the way Ralph's hair is curling in the heat and his white t-shirt is sticking to his body.  
  
Ralph's talking about training plans, and Jack pretends not to watch his pink lips twisting around the words in a furiously hypnotizing manner.   
  
"See you in class" he grumbles, shoving past his unwanted companion. Ralph looks miffed but unsurprised as he watches him go, but he tries not to think about it either way.

 

* * *

  
Jack takes to sitting in the courtyard behind the weeping willow, its long strands hiding him from view as he sits alone with a book and tries to keep his mind quiet.  
  
It's only a matter of time before Ralph finds him all over again.  
  
"I brought you something to eat" he says, hair striking against the cool green of the tree's foliage as he offers an apple.  
  
Jack ignores him.  
  
Ralph sighs and sits heavily in the grass beside Jack. Their hips are almost touching, the ghost of past hot breath and saltwater lips lingering between them.  
  
"Why won't you talk to me?" Ralph asks.  
  
Jack turns the page, words skimming over his head. "There's nothing to talk about" he lies.  
  
Ralph laughs, hard and gentle like hot tea with one too many sugar lumps.  
  
"You tried to kill me, Jack"   
  
The memories come flooding back in a cold wave. Smoke yawning over the trees, the angry, sour sting of cuts across knuckles and knees, hair long and tangled and grey with dust and sun, blood, sticky-sweet and acrid as it crusted on his hands, his face, his chest.   
  
The white willow blossoms fall in between the pages of his book and he can't breathe.   
  
So he turns to Ralph, swings a leg over his hips to straddle him and grabs his jaw, kissing him like it's the ending of the fucking universe, like it was six years before when the world went up in smoke.  
  
Ralph kisses him back, splaying his hands, long, lean hands, across Jack's chest, hot against the wool of his sweater.  
  
Elsewhere, one of the freshmen shrieks as he's pushed into the lake as a part of the hazing process while the seniors cheer and bellow.  
  
Jack shoves Ralph away with enough force to send him falling back on his elbows in the grass, his breath sharp and bitter in his lungs.  
  
Ralph says nothing. He's looking at him with more affection than he'll ever deserve and it makes the briny storm in Jack's chest cease for a few fleeting, sunny moments.  
  
He picks up his book and the apple and leaves, pushing past the pale branches of the willow and walking away. He does not look back. He wants to, but he doesn't.

 

* * *

  
They don't mention it.  
  
Jack tells himself it's not worth mentioning. He doesn't love Ralph, but he's lonely and angry and afraid and maybe it's just as well because everyone else loves Ralph.  
  
He's got a dozen girls in town fawning over him, doe-eyes and pale and saccharine, hair pulled into soft ringlets and dresses like candy wrapping, pale and bright and tempting.  
  
Jack hates them. He hates them because they love Ralph, because they're soft and sweet, everything he _isn't_ , everything he'll never be for Ralph.  
  
He rolls over in his bed and his roommate mutters at him to relax. He lays still, feeling his limbs dissolve into the darkness as he pictures Ralph, pictures him laughing and smiling for _him_ and no one else. It's a selfish dream, hot and spiny as rose bushes grow thick within his chest and throat but he savors the sweetness of their scent even as his breath grows ragged and Ralph's lips taste like copper.  
  
Since they don't mention it, they go about their lives as they've gotten used to doing. They share the afternoon class Creative Writing on Mondays and American History on Friday evenings.  
  
On Fridays they go to the same cafe (coincidently, of course) and order tea and sit at the same table and study together because there's never any empty tables so they just have to make do.  
  
The Friday before the Thanksgiving holidays, they take a back route back to campus on the way home from some kid Jake's house party and Ralph stops, the crunch of the fallen leaves ceasing. He speaks, lips cracked and voice dry as smoke billows into the dark air.  
  
"Would you like to kiss me again?"  
  
Jack feels his chest collapse around his heart and it's only him, a fool in something like love as he surges towards Ralph and pins him against the wall, relishing the way his eyes go wide and the blue-grey fades into the abyss of black.  
  
"God, yes" he admits, and it feels _good._ He crushes their mouths together, lips cold but tongues hot and clumsy and eager. Ralph tastes like cinnamon and whiskey and it's perfect.  
  
"Why don't you hate me?" Jack gasps, in between kisses.  
  
"Don't know" Ralph says, shaky and breathless. "Too pretty to hate"  
  
That night they fuck in the broom closet in the hall next to the dorms and Jack loves every second, loves the way Ralph whines and keens under his touch and the way his breath gets ragged as he chants Jack's name over and over like a prayer.  
  
The autumn holidays come and go and Jack creates a dried-up excuse for his lack of a girlfriend and sits awake at night, hand on his dick as he remembers the way Ralph's fingers dug into his shoulders like a vice.  
  
And really, that's what Ralph is. Jack's greatest vice, the sin he'll always be a slave to, in the end.  
  
School resumes and they're back to fucking, every Friday night after Jack stumbles back to Ralph. He's always drunk but every time he's already disheveled, sweaty and mussed. He won't give Ralph the satisfaction of being his undoing, even as they pull each other apart in the closet or the shower or Ralph's dorm when his roommate's at a game.   
  
They don't talk about it. There's still nothing to talk about.  
  
When winter starts to creep up over the fallen leaves, Ralph stops and Jack's alone again. It was too good to last, he knew, so he pretends he doesn't care and they go back to ignoring each other.  
  
It's not that he's mourning Ralph's company, not really. There had always been something delicious about seeing his former rival submit to him so willingly. It was a power trip, all adrenaline and alcohol and hormones. He didn't _care_ about Ralph.  
  
And yet, part of him ached now that he was alone. He misses the sex, sure, but somewhere he misses just being with Ralph, letting him pretend it was Jack he wanted to kiss, to fuck, to _love_.  
  
Jack scoffs to himself and refuses to think on it any longer.  


* * *

  
He doesn't get reprieve for long. One of the seniors throws a Christmas party the week before hols and Jack's drunk before midnight because if he can't erase the past he can at least blur and blunt it until it's unrecognizable.  
  
Of course, he goes back to Ralph.  
  
Ralph's a good boy who's always on time and never drinks so naturally he's alone in his dorm with his maths homework when Jack stumbles through the door.  
  
Ralph looks up and understands.  
  
"Jack" he says, with something like pity.  
  
Jack growls. "Want you" he says, and Ralph sets his notebook aside in invitation.   
  
Jack practically leaps forward and Ralph's kissing him for the first time in too long against the dorm bunk, sloppy and disheveled as Ralph pulls him closer like he _wants_ him and Jack wishes he wouldn't pretend.  
  
His head's spinning thanks to the whiskey but at least the sounds are gone and there's a textbook and a notebook somewhere on the floor from where he'd kicked them off the bed to press his lips to Ralph's.  
  
They don't say a word to each other, and maybe there's still nothing to be said that hadn't been already, somewhere in the hours of long nights and cold days. Ralph melts under Jack's hands, and he's honest but he's such a good liar that Jack almost lets himself fall.  
  
"I hate you" he hisses into the crook of Ralph's neck. He says it like he means it.  
  
He doesn't.  
  
"I know" Ralph breathes. He doesn't mean it either, running a hand through the flaming curls.   
  
"I hate what you do to me" Jack says again, this time dragging his teeth along Ralph's collarbone, hard enough to leave scratches in the pale skin.  
  
Perhaps Ralph simply doesn't want to hear it because he grabs Jack's face with both hands and puts his tongue down his throat.   
  
"You don't have to get drunk just to see me" Ralph says when they're lying tangled in the sheets, sticky and foul.   
  
Jack only scoffs.  
  
He leaves before morning, and even if it hurts Ralph isn't surprised.   
  
What does surprise him is when Jack returns, suitcase in hand, just as Ralph's finishing packing.  
  
"Hello" he says awkwardly.  
  
"Jack, I - "  
  
"I'm sorry" Jack says, voice rough and shaking like there's gravel in his mouth. "For everything"  
  
Ralph stops, he hand frozen on the lock of his bag.  
  
"You up for tea while we wait for the train, then?" he asks, and Jack wishes he'd look at him.  
  
"Sure" he replies, and half and hour later they're seated across from each other in the train car on the way to London.  
  
Ralph closes the blinds.   
  
"Don't like other people always poking their heads in" he says, and Jack watches the countryside role by without answering.  
  
"I meant it, you know. About being sorry" he says.  
  
"I know" Ralph replies, but it's too late.  
  
"I don't want you to forgive me. I wish you would just hate me like you're supposed to. I'm...I'm the bad guy, aren't I?" Jack says, his voice pitching into hysteria as he fidgets with his hands. "I think I hoped if I just pretended to forget... I would. But I remember every day and it _kills_ me, Ralph. And you act like it never happened! Like you're just above it all and I hate you for that"  
  
There's a long pause and Jack's mouth runs dry. He realizes he's gotten to his feet and his legs are shaking. He sits quickly, and the remains of tea taste bitter on his tongue.  
  
"I still dream about them sometimes" Ralph admits quietly. "I blame myself, you know. I should have done better"  
  
Jack laughs wryly but he can't bring himself to say anything for a moment.  
  
"Is that why we're here now? We hate ourselves so much we have to be around each other to feel alright?" he says finally, almost amused.  
  
"I don't hate myself, Jack" Ralph objects, but the lie is sour on his lips and Jack knows.  
  
"You do. That's why you tried to be my friend. That's why you let me fuck you all those times, because the only way to stop hating yourself is to be around someone worse. And I bet I make you feel like a real hero, don't I? Bet it feels great to be around a murderer when you know your hands are clean!"  
  
Ralph practically throws himself across the car and swallows the rest of Jack's speech with his tongue and the car is silent as they breathe heavily against each other, the sensation still familiar and new all at once.  
  
Ralph's fingers feel wet and Jack is crying, red and gasping and Ralph pulls him close. He traces the shapes of all the constellations he knows on the freckled cheeks. Blue eyes flutter open, and he can see the ocean.  
  
"Jack" he whispers.  
  
The eyes disappear behind freckled lids for a fraction of a second.  
  
"I'm sorry, too"  
  
The gentle words are a balm to the bitterness that still gnaws at Jack's chest even as Ralph leans in to connect their lips again, silent and full as the train moves forward into the night.

**Author's Note:**

> I think Jack majors in Studio Art with a minor in Art History and becomes a surrealist/modernist painter while Ralph majors in English Literature with a minor in Writing and Composition and becomes a novelist and later professor.


End file.
